Mastering issues

V

Vaimler

persevering
Joined
Oct 22, 2004
Location
a long way from home
Hi there,

I master mainly while creating a track, but when listening to the whole track, at a later stage, the overal volume at the climax is a lot louder than at the start
After rendering, the tracks always need gain because compared to other tracks they're just way too low in volume
But doing this gives distortion at certain points
Lowering the volume of the individual samples isn't an option anymore because there just too many of em, layered and balanced to one another..
Automating the volume, then gaining, got close, but I was wondering if there was an easier solution to this like compressing the bounced version
vBeen experimenting with various ratio's but I just get loads of clipping :/
Some tips would be greaty appreciated
 
You should lower the Master level so there's enbough head room to play with upon final mastering. Say if you're tune gets signed and goes to master, the engineer needs headroom to rock it all... anyways back to it.. Lower your master level> Render the master wave file and open it in an \audio editor such as Forge or WavLab. Get a limiter plugin (WavesBundle L2 or L3 are dope!), set the output level to zero and bring the threshold level down to the original level of the track.. this will boost your sound a shit load!!!

Also, make sure you don't over limit, this can cause distortion. And you may want to go back in to the mix and eq out parts of of your instruments that you don't need.

G'Luck!
 
Try not to worry *too* much about your track being loud, the listener/DJ can turn it up much more effectively than you. Concetrate on getting each element sounding right in comparison to the other elements.

Also make sure you've EQ'd/filtered out *all* frequencies you dont need from every sample, you might not here the difference when you lowpass your snare but it frees up space in the mix for other stuff. Also make use of the whole stereo field so that not everythings clogging up the middle of the mix.
 
diodednb said:
yeah I've been haviong probs with teh whole stereo thing in a mix. I been afraid to pan too much.. and don't wanna pan too little.. any tipe on that?
Click to expand...
I'd like to know more about where to put certain sounds using panning (y)
 
//yeah I've been haviong probs with teh whole stereo thing in a mix. I been afraid to pan too much.. and don't wanna pan too little.. any tipe on that?//

first position your speakers correctly, put on some music and adjust your position until you here a "sweet spot" where the music sounds fuller than normal. Next, shut youreyes and imagine the sounds in 3d, you can get a representation of depth aswell as pan with stereo speakers. now try to seperate each sound in your head, see the sounds in your imagination. What do they look like? are they spikey, smooth, big, small etc etc. Once you can see them in your minds eye, load up your track , and postion the pan with your eyes shut. It might sound a bit weird, but it works, and the more you practice the easier it becomes.
 
sdm said:
I'd like to know more about where to put certain sounds using panning (y)
Click to expand...

You can create a lot of space in the mix with panning but in a club it's often mono, or if it's not the sides are very far apart so you probably won't hear stuff. Don't pan anything that has a lot of low end like drums and basslines, you can pan vocals and top end synths. If i pan I'll do it less than half the way in either direction.

Back to the original point: If you've got the overall levels too loud at the end you've either:

1.Set the volumes of individual bits wrong
2.Equed them wrong so you're having to turn the volume up to get them to shine through. It's hard to explain how to get this right so I'll leave that for now.
3.Piled up too many samples as the track goes on. There's only so much you can cram in before people will actually not notice the bits so sometimes you need to take a bit out when you put another one in.
 
Back
Top Bottom